Pre-Proprosal Mtg Transcript 10-28-19.pdf

>> LARRY: Good morning, everybody. Thank you guys for coming. I know it's been a long-awaited process. With the Forest Service, we have some new direction coming down to us from the USDA. They're exercising a lot more, I would say oversight is probably the easiest way to say it for us. We've gone through a lot of iterations of this requirement and then the solicitation to get it to the streets so you all can be here today.

So thank you for coming. If I don't know you, my name is Larry Robillard, the contracting officer. You'll probably hear me a lot today. We've got a pretty full room here, and then we also have a group of people, I heard up to 24 or 25 on the conference call.

>> They really can't hear you on the conference call, they're saying.

>> They're saying they can't hear you very well.

>> You're not picking Larry up?

>> LARRY: Can we maybe put it over here?

>> Then it wasn't picking anything up over here. Remember that?

>> LARRY: I'll just talk a lot louder, and hopefully that helps all.

>> Are you hearing him since he's using the mic closer?

>> That's a lot clearer.

>> LARRY: Perfect. I'm going to hold this all day. All right. Again, welcome, everybody, we've got people on the conference call. Thank you for calling in and being a part of this. And thank you to everybody here for coming. We appreciate your interest. We're excited about this opportunity. I know this contract has been in place for many, many years. So this iteration of our solicitation has some change, some things that are different. We wanted to give everybody an opportunity to have it for about ten days and come and talk to us about any of the concerns. Back in February or March when we did our first solicitation, our first specification --

NOTE: Transcript provided for informational purposes only and the solicitation is the authoritative document for all requirements and instructions pertinent to the National Mobile Food Services acquisition.

10/28/2019 Pre-Proposal Meeting Transcript Solicitation 12024B19R9001 - National Mobile Food Services

>> February.

>> LARRY: For the draft, we got a lot of great feedback and made a lot of changes to that because of the feedback you all gave us, so thank you. I'm going to drive through this. There's not a lot of slides this way, but we're going to put the solicitation up on the screen. If you're on the conference line, I'm going to walk you just through the fact that -- and I didn't want to use a lot of PowerPoint slides in this because you wouldn't have them. So I'm going to -- for the people here physically in Boise, I have a welcome slide that says especially thanks for your interest. If we have any issues, please dial

9-1-1. That's our emergency number. The restrooms are just out the door to the right.

They're just, I think, right off of the food area that you walked by when you came in.

They're just a right and then another right. And then if we have to leave here for whatever reason, we could potentially go out the door behind me, but it seemed like the parking lot was right out a set of doors right past the food area. So I'd like to muster in that area. We have a list of everybody, so we could certainly determine if somebody isn't here. I don't know everybody personally, so if we have an issue, we're going to muster out in that area, and you know, it would be fire or something like that. Today we're just going to talk a little bit, you know, meeting ground rules. With those meeting ground rules we'll have question ground rules. So we'll talk a little bit about that. Then we'll go through the specifications, solicitation, and then we'll do questions and answers.

That's where a on the lot of our time will be spent in the Q&A. Just to briefly introduce everybody from our side, Ivory Carr is in the back of the room. She's waving. Ivory is program manager, and she's just started with us as a program manager a week plus, maybe two weeks now.

>> Two whole weeks.

>> LARRY: Welcome, Avery. She was also a contracting officer in the Incident

Support Branch for a lot of years and then moved into the fab size. She's now come back to us with the program side. So she's on the program manager. Myself, I'm the

CO, contracting officer. Mary Fields is our contracting officer representative. I have

Chris Kirk here. Where is Chris? He's our contract specialist. You've probably received stuff from Chris in the past. If you've never met Chris, this is Chris.

>> Hi, Chris.

>> LARRY: Then we also have Melinda Draper here, the associate branch chief. If you hate me, you can always call her and tell her how much you hate me. That's all good.

And Melinda used to be a CO on this contract years ago, so she understands where we're at with a lot of these things. How does the sound on the conference line? Are you guys picking it up better?

>> It's a little bit difficult, but it's better.

>> Probably just the volume here. You might not turn up the microphone.

>> I'll see about turning up the mic.

>> LARRY: I want to go through, and again if I'm standing in front of you guys, I apologize, I'm at a little bit of a disadvantage here. Our pre-proposal meeting ground rules. We're having an open forum. I want to read these. I generally don't like to read slides. Open forum priding solicitation information through an exchange of question and answers. It's open. We want to hear your feedback. We want to hear your questions. There are no stupid questions, and sometimes there's stupid answers.

And sometimes you may not like the answers. But we will do our best to get you an answer today. And if we can't, and I'll go through the Q&A piece a bit, but if we can't get the answers today, we'll follow up shortly on FedBizOpps with a question and answer that will be our official answers. The stuff we talk about today is for our information. It's probably correct. We may go back and do research and find something needs to be adjusted, so the final questions and answers that we'll get on

FedBizOpps will be the official set of answers. I saw somebody taking pictures earlier.

I'm going to have to say number two says no picture taking or recording of this of any type. Again, all the information presented will be posted on FedBizOpps including all the questions and answers. We will make no agreements, promises or other commitments either by the government or by you contractors participating potential offers. Questions will be answered to the best of our knowledge, and official answers will be posted to FedBizOpps. Now you've seen some of these questions, and I know -- I think I have received four sets of questions or at least four questions from four interested parties. I'm not going to post those or talk about those today. If you want to talk about them today, please write them down on the street and send them back to us so we can go through them in the Q&A. They'll be addressed in FedBizOpps. All questions I've received so far will be addressed in FedBizOpps. If you have a question, I'd like you to write it down for the ease of us. I can't write while I'm talking to make sure we capture all the questions asked. It's laborious for you all, but imagine if we have 40 or 50 or a hundred questions how laborious it would be for one person to take those down. We're asking you to put your questions on paper, get them to us, we'll answer them verbally and respond on FedBizOpps with our official answer. That way you're helping us. If you did send in questions, please do -- is that too loud?

>> It may be a little too loud in the room. I think it's okay.

>> It's a little feedback.

>> You could maybe put it on your lapel now.

>> LARRY: I'm trying, guys. Is that better?

>> No.

>> LARRY: I used to coach hockey, and there wasn't a kid on the ice that couldn't hear

me. I'm always having trouble with this, so it's kind of fun. So we'll post the questions on FedBizOpps and then if you submit a question or you talk in here about a question, please do not put any of your proprietary information on. I will do my best and Mary will do her best to sanitize any of the questions we receive, but at the end of the day, your information may be proprietary to you and you don't want to give that away, so anything said here will be published potentially on FedBizOpps. Just know that going in that anything you talk about today can be discussed or can be written down and put on

FedBizOpps for the world to see. That's my disclaimer there. Our question ground rules, all questions are being provided in writing. Mentioned that. Formal response in

FedBizOpps in one week. Verbal answers today are unofficial until confirmed in writing. When a question generates an additional question, please generate and provide a written question. Susie says something and it sparks on a question. We'd like to get both of them captured. If you ask a follow-on question, please also put that down so we get a copy of it. It's the hardest thing in these kind of interviews and industry days we hold or pre-proposal meeting is getting people to write the questions so I'm beating you over the head. It helps us a lot to make sure we're getting everything. They have the responsibility to monitor FedBizOpps. You guys will see anything that comes of this meeting whether it be questions, addendums to the solicitation will all be posted on FedBizOpps. I won't reach out to all of you and say hey, go look at FedBizOpps. Generally I don't correspond with you all after I do a solicitation. I felt because of the timing, a lot of people were ending the fire season and some didn't even have a fire season. So I want to make sure that everybody at least knew we were out there, so I shot the e-mail that I obviously generally don't do, or obviously I generally do do an e-mail like that. I felt it was important to get it to everybody here. I also included a group of people that have shown interest over the last couple of years. I've tried to make sure I cover everybody in getting the same information. That's really important from my standpoint on a solicitation. That's really the end of the PowerPoint other than we'll have a Q&A. I wanted to jump in to, we'll talk a little bit about the specification and the solicitation, and then we can open it up to questions. Before I get started, any other questions or anything so far with the ground rules today? Okay. So this is a really important date right here. 18th of November, 2:00 p.m., mountain time. You'll have to get your package to us. We're accepting only delivered packages. So it could be through FedEx or whomever, but you'll have to send us a package which includes, I believe, it was two of the business proposals and four of the technical proposals on thumb drives or flash drives. That's how we're asking for the proposals to come in to us.

>> Larry, could you tell them no CDs.

>> LARRY: On flash drives only. It clearly says flash drives. If you submit it in a CD, we won't look at it. So just do what we ask, please. If there is a problem with that, you can certainly reach out to me, and see if there's another way we could do it, but then obviously I would have to make an addendum to the solicitation for everybody. So flash drives, I think, are doable. Yes, Chris.

>> If we could add to that, please properly and adequately label your flash drives with your company name and whether it's your business or technical proposal.

>> LARRY: Please properly label every flash drive with your company name and whether it's the business proposal or the technical proposal. Thank you, Chris. I'm gathering that was a problem once or twice in the past?

>> It was a significant problem. In other solicitations.

>> LARRY: Some basic instructions here are, you know, you'll fill out your SF-1449. It was pointed out to us we referenced the SF-33. That was a typo that we didn't catch.

We used to use SF-33s before it was commercial. In commercial world, we use

SF-1449s. We'll make those changes and obviously send an administrative addendum out that's clean, but then you'll fill out your section B-4, B-5, Exhibit 14. You'll fill out the excel spreadsheet which is your compliance. Another piece you'll have to add to that.

And then the appropriate number of copies will be talked about in section E and E 7, 8, and 9, you also have to address. We're trying to give you on the front if you've never done a government solicitation before, this area here is important. It tells you a lot of the deliverables you have to give back to us. Our address. No facsimiles or e-mails will be accepted on this. It has to be a delivered product, and what do we have to do?

Flash drives. I mentioned an SF 1449. This is literally what it is. You fill out this form here. And you sign it. So your signature will be here. It does say one copy. So I'm going to have to correct that one as well, because we're asking for two business and four technical copies of your proposal on flash drives. You guys can all read through this on our general stuff. I'm not going to go through it. For the sake of getting to our

Q&A, I do want to talk a little bit about our DDPs, our designated dispatch points. And

I'm now on page for the people following at home, I'm on page 6 of the solicitation.

And it talks about the different DDPs. Something we made a change about two years ago was we allowed or we changed the DDP to be your physical address. Rather than the center of the city. The DDPs used to be center of city, but those are changing and sometimes drastically over a 5-year cycle. That center of the city physically changes, and so it opened ourselves up to some potential scrutiny of what's the right DDP address, what's the right starting point. We have decided because we're also calculating mileage from your physical location, your DDP has to be within 75 miles of the location we specify. So for example, in Wyoming, it would be lander. If you looked at Google and there was a pinpoint on lander, you're going to be within 75 miles of that pinpoint to have a physical location there where you're going to be staged or that's going to be your designated dispatch point. When you are awarded that DDP, you're going to give us your physical address, and the physical address you give us will now become the DDP address. It's within that 75 miles of the city, and that becomes the

DDP for this contract cycle. If you change addresses for whatever in, two years in, you have to go to a different location, as long as it's within 75 miles, you have to notify us in writing, and then we'll adjust your DDP to that new location. Any questions on that? I know there was maybe a couple of questions I saw come in that were questioning that one. I just want to -- I thought we addressed it two years ago, but certainly going forward, I want to make sure that the DDP is your physical location where you stage your equipment in. It cannot be a PO box. It has to be a physical address. All right.

Our map of DDPs, I'm moving on. I'm going to talk on page seven a little bit about the mobile food service units. Our B-5 is the schedule of items. It's for the people that have done this in the past. It's very similar. For people that have not done this at all, certainly you can kind of walk through that section B.5. You would put your name, a contact telephone number for dispatch, your unit number. If you have multiple units, that's really helpful, because you could have 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5 or 6 potentially. You'll fill out the total number of hand wash sinks. You can go through all those items there.

And then of the 30 DDPs, we're asking for you to tell us which DDPs you are interested in bidding on. So for example, you may have no interest in bidding on the one in

Lander, Wyoming, so you wouldn't let that on this page here. You may have an interest for Boise or any of them. So ones that you're interested in, please list them.

We'll talk a little bit more about that. Ultimately, this is going to be, and you've seen some big change now is in our best value determination. We're also looking very closely at what is the best value for the government. So if your best price, because you live at Lander and have space to put your equipment at Lander, and you really want

Lander, that's probably going to be your best price. I'm not going to tell you how to solicit to us, but that's kind of the intent here is to give us your best price at that place, because it's going to be competitive. So you know, just being clear, you can list all 30

DDPs and you could say my price is the same for any of the DDPs. That's certainly what you could do. But I would hope that you kind of understand we're looking for your best prices at the ones you want. And obviously your best price at ones you bid on.

So anything you bid on should be your best price, but the intent was not just to give a standard price for the -- for every DDP. It's allowing us you to price each DDP you want with the right pricing. One of the new features as well that we haven't spent a lot of time talking about, but we are looking at which DDPs have the most activity internally.

So those are really, really important to us to be served with the best value. They're all important to us, but I'm just stating that when it comes down to a couple of dollars here or there, we may choose one DDP for one vendor and another DDP for another vendor, because it is the best value to the government. While you put your preference down, we may not use your preference as the determining factor. Primarily, we're using best value as the determining factor for the government. Then you're going to price all five years of the contract. So we've got CLIN 100 by January 2020 that we don't think will be on contract to be brutally honest. It will probably be a little later than this. And maybe this is a good opportunity, since I want to give people on the phone a chance here. I'm trying to think what page -- page 9 is the first time you see the pricing structure. Any questions on this? I want to -- for somebody that hasn't seen this before, any questions that you may have on this one specifically since I'm standing right here doing it? In the room. Go ahead.

>> Sorry. On the supplemental items, number 118, it's the additional refrigeration space. It says total estimated quantities 1536. What is that 1536? Cubic feet?

>> Yes.

>> Can we reiterate at question.

>> LARRY: On the supplemental items number 118 additional refrigeration, the total estimated quantities is 1536. So that -- and so that's a question is what is that 1536 represent? And if you look the unit of measure is cubic feet per day. So 1536 is the total estimated quantities.

>> Per day?

>> Four days.

>> Four days or per day? It says times four days.

>> 1,536 for four days equals 300-something cubic feet.

>> LARRY: Okay. I'm letting Mary answer this one.

>> I'm not as fast on my calculator. Who answered that question? So you're saying that that figure 300-something.

>> 1,536 equals eight times eight times six times four.

>> So it's --

>> It's not for four days.

>> So that total quantity is for four days. It's just like the brewed coffee. Over there we say it's 80 -- yeah, we want that listed for four days.

>> So 1,536 is for four days, not per day, which it states.

>> What is price per unit? Would that be for the one day and extended over?

>> We could take out that four days.

>> What I'm trying to ask is are you trying to get a price for 1,536 cubic feet? Total?

>> We're trying to get a price for eight by eight by six, we're talking feet, and then we have it times four days. That could be not correct.

>> Okay.

>> We will clarify that, how that is written. It's not correct in there. We'll clarify that and I'm not going to tell you we'll do it for sure. We'll take it under advisement that we'll take out that four days and make sure our calculation under total estimated quantities is correct. And so when you see evaluated at eight by eight by six, we're look at cubic feet per day, and that total estimated quantity will be per day.

>> Thank you.

>> LARRY: Okay. Any other questions on this sec here?

>> We do, if you want people to be able to ask questions, we need to have the moderator open up the line for the phone.

>> LARRY: On the phone, I'm going to hold that only because of convenience for no other reason. If you want to come back to this, we certainly can. I just had it up here, and there's certainly a group of people here, and you may have the same question they

do. If we aren't asking your question, please write it down yourself and ask it with we open up the phone lines for questions. Thank you. So I'm just moving down through the -- you'll see the 200 series is the second year. 300 series is the third year. The

400 series and 500 series. And that takes us through section B which is our pricing.

That's the schedule. When you submit your proposal, that's the pricing that you're going to fill in that will be evaluated at various DDPs. We also have -- I'm going to scroll back up. I think I missed something here. Bear with me. I'm now right at the top of B.5 which is page 8. There's a check box to the right of your MFSU unit number.

That check box is a call when needed MFSU. A new feature we've added to this solicitation is the ability to have call when needed mobile food service units on agreements or contract. So if your MFSU is being bid for -- and you have one only and it's being bid for any of the DDPs, if you're not successful in obtaining a DDP, you cannot have a call when needed MFSU. So I want to reiterate that one more time. If you have one MFSU, or if you do not get a DDP with multiple MFSUs, you cannot have a call when needed. And the rationale behind that is because of the type of contract we have. It's an IDIQ. It has to carry a minimum guarantee. The call when neededs are not guaranteed at all. So there's no guarantee for a call when needed. So if you do have multiple units, and you get at least one DDP, your other units can be available for call when needed orders or call when needed contracts. I know that's different, so I wanted to be clear on that. That's an area I hadn't talked about. The call when needed units are essentially identity to the regular MFSUs, the exclusive use. I'll say that one more time. I know it's a little different. If you do not have a DDP, you can't have a call when needed. If you do have a DDP and you have a unit that did not get selected, you can have a call when needed. A couple of unique items on the call when needed are you can locate that call when needed anywhere you want. So that unit could be at your home office. It could be anywhere you want it to be. You just have to provide us the physical location, and if you're going to be opening up your multiple units to call when needed. So for example you get one and don't get your other unit on contract and want to be call when needed, you would check that box and create a pricing structure for your call when needed prices at the location that you choose. So if you want the call when needed to be priced or evaluated, you're going to do a separate pricing structure, separate schedule B for the call when needed only at the physical location you determine and that's your pricing that you'll be evaluated on. We're only awarding 30 DDPs, same as the previous contract, and they're the same DDPs for that matter, and we're having an unlimited number of call when needed available. It's kind of a unique situation. You do have to have an exclusive use on contract before you are able to have a call when needed on contract. Call when neededs take priority over going to our EERAs. So two years ago, we wrote 14 EERAs, I believe, and those

EERAs were written because there was no capability left. Everybody was on incident or unavailable. So at the point where we ran out of capability, we started calling anybody we could find that could do what we needed them to do and writing separate contracts for short periods of time with that individual. This call when needed is going to be in front of that position. So we would do our exclusive use, and then call when needed, and then EERAs.

>> So just to clarify, apologize. If you submit a proposal, you have one unit to propose, and you check mark mobile food service unit, and if you are not awarded a location, you're done. You cannot be a call when needed? You would have to be third position which would be an EERA?

>> LARRY: Correct. The question was in case you didn't hear it, if you only have one unit, and you're not selected a DDP, that unit is not eligible for a call when needed.

That is correct. It's not eligible for a call when needed. We would be pleased and happy to put you on our EERA list, and then we would have you as a resource to call after all other resources have been exhausted. All right.

>> Larry. When you talk about the maximum number of breakfasts, lunches, and dinners. It's on that same chart. It's under B.5.

>> LARRY: Okay. And that's different. That's right. One other area that was different from the previous contract cycle was the maximum number of breakfasts, lunches, and dinners you would have. So in the past, we've had a minimum requirement of 1,200 at any sitting. That minimum stays as 1,200, but we also ask you to tell us what your maximum is. And we understand that you could probably do a lot more than lunches than you could do sit-down meals, so we've given you the opportunity to tell us how much lunches you can make your maximum at. If we're at an incident, and I'm just going to use some round numbers, you've stated that you can do 2,000 lunches, we now have a need for 3,500 lunches. At the point you stated what your maximum was that you would be able to deliver that day at the specified time, and if you said 2,000 and we needed an additional 1,500, at that time, the government can make a decision to go and procure those lunches elsewhere.

>> The whole lot?

>> LARRY: No, just the excess. You're telling us what you can do. We're giving you guys -- and I heard some horror stories the last couple of years about leaders asking for

4,000 and 5,000 lunches and being upset because contractors could not provide it.

They didn't have that much product and could not get it in time to make those lunches.

So we're trying to protect you all by stating this. We're also willing to talk to you all in a food unit leader is given the authority and the latitude to say, you know what, I think they might be able to do more lunches than they said. You, because of your situation on this incident only could get enough product to do an additional 1,500. He can procure those from you at your price. We're not limiting you at the 2,000. If we choose to, though, we can, even though you may say, I can do 1,500 more, we may have -- we have the right, but we are stating that we may go elsewhere and get those lunches delivered. So just know that. It's got to be kind of a symbiotic relationship within your food leader and your kitchen manager who says they can or cannot do it. If you're given that opportunity to perform the extra and you can't deliver, that's bad for all of us, so you know, just be reasonable when you're stating what your maximum is. I realize lunches are very lucrative. I get that. So we want you to have the opportunity to deliver as many lunches as you can. Because we want you out there being profitable.

If you're not profitable, you're not helping us. That's a big part of this. We want to be and give you as much rope so that you can be successful. We're not trying to hang you with that rope either. But you could hang yourself if you do something like say oh, yeah, I can deliver 6,000 lunches and 5:00 a.m. or 4:00 a.m. comes and you didn't deliver. That's bad. Just know that going in. If you're having problems with a food unit leader and I realize this is probably going into the fact that you have a contract so bear with me. If you're having problems with the food unit leader, call Mary. Call myself, when we're out in the field, and we'll help that food unit leader understand what we're saying. This is different. It will take some growing pains as we get on contract.

Ultimately, we're trying to protect you all from having the expectation you can never deliver but trying to give you the flexibility to be able to deliver if you can. So in the situation where you could go and get more product and make an additional 1,500, we want to give you that opportunity. So.

>> Larry, a couple of hands.

>> If you needed to find additional lunches, where would you reach out to? Would you call a call when needed unit in or an EERA to help?

>> LARRY: I don't know. That's up to the incident personnel.

>> Can we rephrase the question?

>> LARRY: So the question was where we would get the additional lunches?

>> Right. And is it a possibility to call in a call when needed or an EERA?

>> LARRY: That's a possibility. Larry does not order those lunches. Mary does not order those lunches. She may on your incident. In our role here, we wouldn't answer that question. It's going to be whatever they can find. You know, it could be MREs.

They could supplement those -- there's nobody available to deliver so we may do MREs for those 1,500 additional. I can't answer that officially. You know, in the past, we've used some sandwich companies. We've gone to subway. We've gone to the sub shop here, fire house sub. We ordered thousands of lunches from them when we had the Soda fire. We ordered thousands of lunches from them. We just have to -- wherever the buying team can find it, the local incident team, that's what they'll do.

It's not just a set kind of position. We're hoping that you guys can deliver it. That's the easiest solution for everybody is for everybody to have that capability. We don't you guys held up to a number that you can't sustain and get a poor review, get a bad name.

We're trying to protect it. In the contract you'll have a stated amount that you have a maximum to.

>> Now, with these lunches, will we be -- let's say -- I think the speck says 1,500. We put that we can meet your need for the 1,500. Will we be guaranteed that order of lunches or whatever it is up to that number or can a food unit leader say I don't want to deal with ordering lunches every single day. I'm going to order 10,000 today and we don't do any lunches?

>> LARRY: I don't know. I'll let Mary answer that. I'm not an incident purchasing.

>> Can you reiterate the question too.

>> So the question was if the caterer would be guaranteed the order number of lunches, and not having the government contract out for those lunches that should be going to you.

>> Correct.

>> Yes. You're correct. When we have 1,500 lunches, and you say you can do 1,500, we'll order from you, because you're on-site.

>> If I say 1,500, and your need is 1,600, and the food unit leader is I'm not going to call a sandwich guy because he's not going to deliver a hundred lunches for me, I need to order 3,000 to get them to me. So the supply chain for us is in shambles. We have to tell our vendors I don't need those groceries because I don't know when I'll need my next lunch order.

>> You're entitled to your three meals per day unless circumstances come up that you can't do those three meals per day. So we will always go to you first for those lunches.

If you have 1,500 as your maximum, and we need 1,600, we will go to you first and ask you can you make another 100 lunches and deliver them on time. And if the answer is no, then the food unit leader will have discussions with the buying team, and the buying team will look elsewhere to procure those lunches.

>> The hundred?

>> Yes, the 100.

>> Not the 1,500.

>> I understand that. What if the vendor says it's not cost-effective for me to send you a hundred lunches today. I need a minimum order of 1,000?

>> The question is what if the contractor says that they are not going to deliver a hundred, because it's not cost-effective?

>> Not the contractor.

>> The sandwich maker. So I'm a little bit lost in this question.

>> Maybe we can answer that from a buying team perspective. They're going to negotiate that.

>> I'll go to another vendor and get the lunches somewhere. If the unit says we need these lunch, and they get someone that says no, we're not going to deliver unless it's

3,000, they'll move on to the next one. They have a list of sources supply list, and they just go to their list, and you know, if someone tells them that, they'll move o they won't send us 3,000 lunches if we haven't ordered 3,000 lunches.

>> Okay. What I'm seeing is I just see a supply chain issue. We're thinking -- planning out and days ahead and telling our vendors, bring in the truckloads.

We're doing this many lunches and then we've maxed out. We can't do 1,600 lunches am we're maxed out. And the food unit leader needs 1,600. Some local vendor won't deliver just a hundred lunches. I've said to the vendor, I don't need any more product.

They're going to do this on their own now. Then you can't get the lunches.

>> The government will find the lunches if we're in that kind of a situation. That's why we have a buying team. That's why we have purchasers with credit cards, and they will not let them get corners into delivering more than we need for that day.

>> Okay.

>> Oh, boy.

>> LARRY: Maybe another answer to that as well is if you're coming up as the contractor against something you feel isn't equitable, so for example, to bridge a gap, they're in fact going to harm you by doing that, you know, because obviously they wouldn't order lunches the next day because they have 3,000 sitting there waiting to be used. If you run into that situation, call me. Because ultimately, we can't be purchasing stuff in advance. That's just the antideficiency act 101. You have to have a bona fide need. With that, if you're finding they're doing other things other than buying for what they need, and then ultimately, you're getting harmed by that, reach out to me. Please.

>> Okay.

>> LARRY: As a CO, that's my job to understand what happened, and then ultimately make a determination whether they did something that harmed you. Because we're using you guys -- we're abusing you guys, to our benefit. So the intent is never to harm you. And if that were the situation, then I'd like to know about it, and I would like to come visit that food unit leader or whoever made that purchase, that buying them and explain to them the rules of contracting and how they were just now antideficient. So

I'm not going to say it's not going to happen, because people are trying to be creative, but we have to not harm our contractors. And when it happens, I want to know about it.

>> A question over here.

>> You have three questions in the room. So can you take them.

>> LARRY: Yep. Go ahead.

>> When you're out there, rationality goes out the window. Oh, they shouldn't be ordering more in advance. And I know you say you want to know. I think you guys need to have a plan, that is what's going to happen, and I told myself to bite my tongue and sit here and listen, but I think that you guys need to know. That's what's happening out there. Even with us happening.

>> It happened two weeks ago.

>> It's no different with the lunches than it is with dinners. If the food unit leader orders

1,200 dinners, and then all of a sudden they have to feed 1,800, we're not going to go somewhere else for those dinners. We're going to go to you and say can you serve more dinners. If you can't serve more dinners, then we have to go to the buying team to buy pizza or somebody else. We'll always come to you first to see if you can make the amount of breakfast, lunch, or dinner, that we're ordering. Because you're entitled to that based on your contract.

>> I'm just talking more about the recoil of them ordering way more for the next day on the lunches and then not using us and us missing.

>> LARRY: I want to know about it. California two weeks ago. I want to know about it and talk to that food unit team and buying leader and straighten them out. You guys have a position if you want to use it for a request for equitable adjustment. If there were 1,500 lunches served the next day, and you got zero, but you served breakfast and dinner, that's a problem. That's not what we intended in this contract. So you know, buying teams have to be accountable to the federal acquisitions such as Larry does as a CO.

>> How does that work if they're working with a local government as a food agency?

>> That's a totally different question.

>> The contract still applies.

>> If talking about working with someone other than a federal cooperator for this contract, that's a totally different question, and we can't answer that.

>> LARRY: But if you're under my contract, call me. If it's on the national contract, I don't care who the coordinating agency is, if you're using my contract --

>> There's a lot of [not audible]. It's becoming problematic much there's local governments and state governments involved in the kitchen decisions and they're making their own unilateral decisions and it's affecting caterers.

>> The questions on the phone, we're using a lot more unified command, and it's getting more difficult for the food unit leader to determine the numbers. And that's -- unfortunately, that's how incidents roll. But we're going to hold you to what you've bid in your contract, and hopefully, if it grows, and you can provide more, then you know, that's what we're going to do. If we have to, though, like I said, if you have

1,500 dinners, and you can't do any more, I'll go to the buying team and say I need

McDonald's or I need pizza. I need something to feed these people. Yes.

>> Is the buying team going to be held to the specks in the contract?

>> The question was is the buying team going to be held to the specks in the contract?

>> We're kind of veering away from the intent of the meeting with a lot of these more administrative --

>> This is a new clause and they're trying to get their arms wrapped around this new clause. But yes, that question probably -- and the buying team has guidelines for lunches. Their lunches are established based on our guidelines.

>> If they're different from the specks in the contract, would the food -- could we work with the foodal to follow those guidelines?

>> No. Your contract is your contract, and you'll always have to use your contract.

>> Okay.

>> We won't ask you for more, and we won't ask you for less as far as quantity or quality.

>> Okay. So the lunch specks are the same for when you're buying outside of or they're different? And we're not allowed to follow them?

>> They may not be the same for those lunches what we pay you either.

>> LARRY: The question was if they're not from the contract, are the lunch specks the same? The answer is no, they're not. They could go to subway and get a thousand sandwiches and a thousand bags of chips and give those to people as some sustenance. They're not held to our national contract f they're on our national contract, you have to deliver exactly what you say you will. If they're asking for something different, your answer is no, because you're actually breaching the contract I set up with you and Mary set up with you, because what gave the food unit leader the right to change it? Absolutely nothing. He has no power to change the contract. So the contract is what the contract is, and that's what I want you guys to deliver, price, and since we're on the proposal side, I want you to price you'll be delivering it, and I want to be clear. Sorry. I might have to get water. I want to be clear. We want to help you guys out there as contractors. Again, I'm very clear in saying you need to be profitable.

If you're not profitable, you do us no good 2 or 3 years from now. We're not trying to harm anyone. Thank you. Any other questions on this one? Melinda.

>> Just to be clear, Larry, a vendor can price their units different prices at different locations just as saying for the call when needed I can price if I want to bid a certain price in California versus a certain price in --

>> LARRY: Correct.

>> Mexico, I don't have to give the same price.

>> LARRY: You could have three call when needed prices for one unit. You could have a call when needed price for locating it in Santa Maria, California. You could have the same unit priced as a call when needed for Boise, Idaho. And that price might be substantially different. But you may want to be call when needed -- have that flexibility. The idea behind the call when needed was any capability we can get, because in I think three of the five years we were writing EERAs. Any capability we could get that we had access to, we would like to know about it and have that as an initial line of defense when all of our exclusive use are used. So when we have exhausted all our resources, we want to have that ability. Question.

>> Can the call when needed change locations throughout the year?

>> LARRY: No.

>> What was the question?

>> LARRY: Can a call when needed change locations throughout the year? No.

You've been awarded the call when needed on that price. Now, if there's a reason to change, the facility you're at has been sold and you no longer can lease it from them, then yes, we would have to address that.

>> But you can't follow the fires around.

>> LARRY: You're not moving fire to fire, and my price change this, my price changed that. That's not the intent of a call when needed. I have to watch you guys every step of the way. Yes. Jesse.

>> I know you said that the exclusive use will go first and then call when needed. What if the only exclusive use is Corona, California and the incident is in butte, Montana and will take them four days to serve and they need food right now. Will they get bumped and the EERA.

>> LARRY: Mobile requirement includes meeting date and time. If we can't meet and time, we don't have a mobile requirement, we can't do it. And we've run into situations where we brought people way too far and sure enough, the minute they left, two days later, there's a fire where they should have been. Now we have to bring somebody else over to get their fire, and it caused us some real consternation two years ago or last year, sorry. Last year, it caused us a lot of consternation. Ideally we'll talk a lot about our ordering procedures, because those are quite a bit different, and I've had questions about it. We'll talk about that and that might help you understand and define reasonable distance. Yes.

>> Just for clarification. If we submit a DDP location, then we need to have a separate set of documents for a call when needed and submit the request for the DDP in addition to the call when needed for each location to be considered?

>> The question was do I have to submit separate documents -- I would assume you're talking pricing because that's all we're talking about is the section B.5. Do I have to submit a separate proposal for a call when needed? No, you don't have O.T. I would anticipate there's some price difference for a call when needed and an exclusive use for whatever reasons much that's up to you. I would anticipate the call when needed should be priced differently, but it does not have to be. You could say this is my price for Boise, Montana, wherever you want to be, and my call when needed. That's just my price.

>> It could be 1 or 2?

>> LARRY: But as Melinda said, you could have several call when neededs. I want to see if I can put it in Boise. I want to see if I can put it in Reno and down in Tucson.

>> You could have a call when needed in locations you're not listed as a DDP?

>> Anywhere you want.

>> LARRY: Don't put in Alaska, though. Alaska isn't going to help you.

>> Except this year.

>> LARRY: This year, you're exactly right. Good point. There's always an exception.

>> You may have said this, but are the requirements for the CWN the same as the --

>> LARRY: Exactly.

>> What was the question.

>> Are the requirements for the CWN the same for our standard MFSU.

>> So 1,200 feels and 1,500-sack lunches.

>> LARRY: We want exactly what you would have done. There's no difference.

>> Tents, tables, chairs, sack lunch.

>> Sand washing station.

>> LARRY: Exactly. You can list off every item on there and I'll say exactly every time.

>> It will only be awarded a CWN if it's a kitchen that was proposed for this solicitation and you were awarded a contract.

>> Correct.

>> And there's only a certain number of units.

>> This is really picky. I want to be careful when we use the term exclusive use. It's not similar to when we talk about exclusive use aircraft, because those are exclusively ours. They cannot go work anywhere else.

>> LARRY: Fair.

>> When we talk about the regular contract locations, it's just a regular unit under this contract versus a call when needed unit. You can go work elsewhere with your regular unit. You're not exclusively ours.

>> LARRY: Agreed. And that's right. I have to stop using that. We were thinking exclusive use initially. You're right, Melinda. That's a good definition. It's right.

You're going to see something a little different. We actually have a threshold of unavailability annually. So that's something that's new that will allow you to do some stuff, but if you're going to be unavailable every year for the whole map, you're not going to be on the contract for very long.

>> I may be getting ahead of myself, but under the ordering protocol you're going to talk about coming up, your unit that's been inside, you've been awarded a DDP and you're a contractor and you've been there the entire length of your MAP, when you want to be able outside of your MAP, can be at your home base of operations or stay at your DDP, does that have any -- is it still going to be dispatched under the best value? Do you not become kind of a call when needed at that point.

>> LARRY:

>> LARRY: You do become a bit of a call when needed so you're ahead of the call when neededs. The nationals are ahead of the call when needs in all instances.

>> Even outside the MAP?

>> LARRY: Yes. We'll go through it. The MAP is priority even more so at your DDP is priority. For example, you're leaving an incident and not at your MAP or not at your

DDP but still in your MAP, everybody in DDP is priority over people leaving and coming back home. If you're traveling and not at your DDP. Therefore, you're below in priority of somebody that's already at their DDP. If you go unavailable, even though you're in your MAP, you're not a priority. You're kind of, obviously, you're unavailable. So if you're at your DDP and in MAP, you're in that first group of people that will be looked at for best value determination. I'm going to move on here, because we're going to kill ourselves with questions. I'll sliding through all of that pricing again in section B.

Section C is our clauses. So I don't know if there's a lot to discuss here. I may be just going to let you guys bring up questions to me at the question period about all the clauses if you have one specific. I don't want to go through all of these. Mary, is there any of the clauses or Ivory or Melinda, anything there you want to outline? Okay. I'm going to blow through them. If you have a question, please bring it up during the question period. Or now.

>> We don't always know where there's construction on the roads that you called us up.

In the past I've ran into it, called ahead and dealing with construction at this point. No estimated time to get through. I could be late, trying to give them a heads-up, communicating when we can with what we have. Is that an act of God? We don't know.

>> It says delay of contract.

>> We're on the contract. Google maps doesn't tell us where construction is all the time. Other apps will. I can't figure that out all the time or a wreck that's going to hold you up for hours.

>> LARRY: I can't go through every scenario that could happen. I love what you just said, though. I called and communicated. I talked. I told them what was going on. It wasn't you not getting wheels up for half a day. It was some rationale that happened on your route. I get that. If the food unit leader can't -- if a food unit leader is going to give you some grief over that, call us, please. Just call the contracting officer. Call

Mary. Call Larry. We would like to be as reasonable as we can be.

>> Even if -- there's a lot of time we don't have cell service in some of these remote locations. It might be hours before we get it.

>> LARRY: I can't go through every scenario. I just can't. I'll be -- and Mary will be as reasonable as we can be. That's all. But gosh, out of eight incidents, you were late six of them, there's a problem. I'll be reasonable on incident one, incident two, I'm starting to go why are we having this conversation again this year. Incident three -- again, it's going to come down to an excusable delay, yeah, something you can't control, but you know, at end of the day, it's happening to everybody out there, I assume. If you're the only company that ever has to have a problem with that, then maybe there's something else going on. I would do a little more investigation personally. But ultimately, I don't know if it's been an issue. Maybe you've run into somebody that was just not very willing to work with you. But I really like what you said when you said you were communicating. That's all we can do. It's all you can do is say I'm stuck on interstate 85 with a wreck, and I can't do anything about it. But if you communicate as well -- and again, if you're out of cell service, it's kind of tough. If you're communicating, at least they can know you were planned for dinner, because remember, dinner is now the new standard. First meal is always dinner. So you were planned for dinner, and you can't make it. Let them know that they've got 300 people they've got to figure out what to get food for.

>> It was my understanding that most truck drivers have a site similar to Google map that tells them what's going on on that road aside from a wreck. It's pretty updated from what I understand. I'm told truck drivers pull up their route. If it's construction, it reroutes you around the construction. That's pretty typical for anyone driving a truck.